The Biden administration’s Virtual Embassy for Iran used a quote by Vice President Kamala Harris translated into Farsi to castigate the US this week for xenophobia, anti-Semitism, homophobia and other forms of discrimination.
“The truth is: there is racial discrimination in America,” read the translated social media post from Wednesday. “There is xenophobia in America. Anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, homophobia, transphobia, all exist. Tackling injustice wherever it is, activity is ahead.”
The State Department posted an English-language version of the tweet on Jan. 17 to mark Martin Luther King Jr. Day.
“.@VP on injustice,” the post began before quoting Harris. “‘Here’s the truth: Racism exists in America. Xenophobia exists in America. Anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, homophobia, transphobia, it all exists. The work to address injustice wherever it exists remains the work ahead.'”
A White House official confirmed to The Post that the quote is taken from remarks Harris made this past May at a ceremony for President Biden signing the COVID-19 Hate Crimes Act.
It is unclear why the State Department and virtual Iran embassy accounts posted the quote approximately nine months after the bill signing. The White House official told The Post no direction was given to post the Harris statement.
Critics lambasted the post — with several directing their ire at Harris, despite the tweet not coming from her own account.
“Kamala Harris tweeting in Iran’s official language that the US has a long list of problems. She thinks this makes her look enlightened,” Republican strategist Ron Nehring tweeted. “In that part of the world it will be seen as projecting overwhelming weakness.”
“We have democracy, freedom of speech, rule of law and equality under it,” wrote former Republican Rep. Scott Taylor. “We have the ability to move towards a more perfect union. None of this is true in Iran. This is a disgraceful tweet by our Vice President.”
Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo also jumped in on the criticism, saying, “For Vice President Harris to suggest moral equivalence between the Iranian regime’s desire to eliminate Israel and a national policy of gender apartheid with American equality under the law is truly dangerous and ungrounded in reality. Americans are better than this.”
The State Department launched the Virtual Embassy for Iran in 2011. Its website claims to be the “primary official resource for the Iranian people to get information directly from the US government about US policy and American values and culture.” The US and Iran have had no formal diplomatic relations since 1980.
Iran has a long-standing history of xenophobia, homophobia and other forms of discrimination.
Earlier this month, the country’s hardline Islamic government executed two gay men who were convicted of sodomy after spending six years on death row, according to the Human Rights Activists New Agency. Homosexuality is illegal in Iran.
Last May, the State Department released a report on religious freedom in the country and found several “abuses and restrictions on worship by religious minorities.”
Since 1999, the US has designated Iran to be a “Country of Particular Concern” under the 1998 International Religious Freedom Act for severe violations of religious freedom.
Additionally, the US has accused the country of “violence against ethnic minorities” as well as other human rights abuses, including unlawful detention, torture, summary executions, restrictions on the press, child labor and human trafficking.